Mid-life comedy “Jumpy” strikes a chord

If you’re looking for a night out at the theatre, the new comedy drama “Jumpy” by April de Angelis, might well strike a chord. A mother, a wife, and fifty, Hilary once protested at Greenham. Now her protests tend to focus on persuading
her teenage daughter to go out fully clothed! Sound familiar?

This play first appeared in October 2011 at the Royal Court Theatre. As theatre reviewer Peter Brown explains, much of the story will be a familiar one to parents who have had the tortuous, unenviable task of dealing with children passing through the teenage years with bodies flooded with hormones and whose sole aim in life appears to be to irritate their parents into an early grave. But ‘Jumpy’ is not just about a teenager, Tilly, struggling to cope with the transition from childhood to adulthood. It’s also about her mother Hilary (Tamsin Greig) who, at 50, finds she also has to deal with age-related issues.

“How often do you get a West End play that’s intelligent, funny and puts contemporary mid-life women centre stage?”Lyn Gardner for The Guardian

“The writing is perceptive, even if sometimes it feels as though it has traded nuance for comic breadth… Politically the play could pack more of a punch, but Jumpy is worth seeing for Greig alone.”Henry Hitchens for The Evening Standard